Is Time Fair?
by Debora Wain
Summary: It's been over 10 years. The war has ended and the machines no longer exist. A scientist, his men and his daughter come across a rare body. A rare man who goes by the name of Marcus Wright.
1. Chapter 1

Doctor Elaine Thorn wrote down the precise heart beats the monitor showed. Her father, Randall Thorn, was known to be the only scientist who could bring anyone or _anything_ back to life. Though Elaine was known to be very serious when in the line of her work, that night she couldn't help but keep shooting looks from the corner of her eye at the man that rested on the table. She closed the pad on her hands hanging it on the hook next to the monitor while clicking her pen and shoving it down the chest pocket of her dingy doctors robe. Her hand trailed up the table as she made her way to the mans side. Part human, part robot. She had never imagined she could see such a case. She had operated on everyone that lived in the base, she knew everything that needed to be known to save any life since she was thirteen thanks to her deceased mother. But, to the point of a man being half of them and half of the things that had cause the annihilation of a great deal of humanity, seemed beyond any dream she could remember from childhood. The look on her fathers face when she returned to base with the man hanging from her shoulders, gave her a glimpse of the doors of war she was opening. A machine still existant was against everything they believed in.

Her aqua eyes studied the man she had found buried under a thin layer of sand. Her mind couldn't help but think he was soon to be in his thirties when she was only five. He was beyond any knowledge she could ever imagine of or anyone could for that matter. She rose a trembling and hesitating hand. Did she dare touch him? Her hand made her way towards his face but she pulled back as his eyes sharply opened. He studied his surroundings and made a stop to examine Elaine.

"What's your name?" he asked, Elaines heart thumping hard as ever. He seemed so much like a man. Was it all a deception of the machines?

"I'm known as Doctor Elaine Thorn. Do you have any name? We've tried to find any record of you in the small archives we have but you're no where to be found," she spoke with a secureness she was unaware of having.

"My name is Marcus Wright," he swallowed and led his eyes to the sealing. Elaine pressed down on the small rounded earring on her ear, a see-through screen appearing in front of her. "What year is it?"

Elaine looked down at Marcus. "It's 2028."

Marcus closed his eyes. Another time, another year. Was he bound to be revived and die only to live again?


	2. Chapter 2

"Elaine." Marcus called as she came to a halt ordering for the others to continue to the medical room. And so they did, holding on to the hovering bed where a small child lay panting. "What's wrong with her?"

"She has leukemia. Is there anything I can do for you Marcus? Any wounds?" she asked a bit rudely as duty called.

"No. I'm good."

"Good," she ran down the hall.

It had been a month since Marcus had been dragged in to the base by Elaine. He had to learn the basics of the present and would have to endure that no one was accepting him. Except the child he had just seen being rushed in to the medical halls. He walked by the halls like a ghost. He would normally have the small child behind him or have Elaine giving him books and objects that would make him acquaint with the year. He found himself sitting down arming weapons for the base. Elaine watched as she walked in the darkness towards him.

"How is she?" he asked knowing very well of her presence.

"She's holding on. We gave her some antibiotics that are suppose to let her breath easier," she sat in front of him, her long reddish braid falling down her shoulder as she looked down at her laced hands. "She's the only person in the base that doesn't treat you like the enemy," she smiled. "I guess you'd only have me bossing you around if anything happened to her," she tightened her hands, tears rimming her eyes at the idea of loosing such a young child.

Marcus cocked the gun in his hands. "You know what you're doing. Or isn't that why you're know as Doc?"

She smiled. "I think you just made a joke. A sad one but hey, you have to start somewhere," she wiped the forming tears and stood. "Come on comrade. I have to go on with my nagging if you're planning on surviving in this time," she began to lead the way with a following Marcus.

Their boots echoed against the metal floor of what was the library. Elaine ran her fingers down the shelfs as Marcus turned studying the varios books that seemed older then the base itself. "What are they about?"

"Most of them are medical, mechanical, science and history books for anyone in the base who has the interest. We've kept them as well of the history that they hold."

"History?"

"No one makes books anymore," he watched as she passed pages of a book that seemed to be a mechanic guide. "Here, this is more than informative for you."

"Mechanics? You sure they trust you giving this to me?"

"What? That you'll build the army that everyone is so afraid of you rising?"

"You don't believe them."

"Why should I? I saved you. You don't have what it seems they had when they were about to destroy all of us. Besides," she looked in to his blue eyes. "I saw your heart. Machine or not, I believe in the heart. And yours is a strong one."

"You shouldn't be so confident."

"You don't scare me," she stood closely. "At all."

He found himself smiling as she walked out of the room before passing the pages.


	3. Chapter 3

"No!" Elaine shouted awake, Marcus looking down at her.

He sat beside her, his hand running down to her heart. It thumped against his palm, shouting to be free from the cage that was her chest. "You alright?" he asked looking at her sweating face and panting body. "You need to calm down," he ran a hand down her forehead wipping away the cold sweat she was drowning in.

"Easy to say," she panted. "You didn't jut dream of your death."

"How did it happen?" she noticed the tone of hesitation as he asked this. She looked into his eyes. Did she dare say he was the one who she saw pulling the trigger? Her silence and worried eyes gave him all. "How did I do it?" he pulled away and sat on the edge of the bed, starring down at the hands he now suspected would have her blood.

"You didn't kill me. You'll never kill me," she sat up. "You're not someone who could destroy others," she sighed.

"Someone?"

"Will you ever believe anything I say? Or would you rader hear everything that the others in the base comment?"

"You have to get it through your head already," he snapped taking hold of her wrist, their noses touching. "I'm a machine. I'm bound to destroy something or someone," he spoke with pain on the tip of the beating heart she had given him back.

"You will never be a machine to me," tears rimmed her eyes as her body heated with his, her breath mingled with his.

He watched her, felt her skin and pulse starring down at her lips. Lips that captivated him and made him feel more human for wanting them.

"Elaine we need you in the ER immediately," Nicolas knocked on her door.

They both pulled away. "That's my final word on the subject. I won't change what I believe," she sighed pulling her jeans on. She ignored the question of how he made it into her room and simply wondered off into his touch as she made her way to the ER.

Marcus rubbed his face and walked down the empty halls. Was he really something more than a machine to her? Was it possible that someone considered him more than some destruction?


	4. Chapter 4

Elaine's fingers pressed down easily and quickly on the computer keys. Her eyes never daring to leave the screen as she was determined to find any medical record that tide Marcus to a human-being. Her body had barely slept, her fingers still held a reddish color after working with a patient and being drenched with his blood, her robe scrunched down on the floor as strands of her hair framed her face. With the back of her hand she rubbed her eyes. She had refused to sleep. She knew that she couldn't after having such dreams that not only included her death, but the invasion of the base. Sighing and pushing her back to the back of the chair, she closed her eyes. Her mind flashed briefly to the closeness both Marcus and her had shared in her bedroom. It had been the very first intimate conversation they'd had. And yet she didn't find it the least bit odd. Her words were indeed what she thought and felt. What she believed to be the truth of his very being. Her mind had blocked any other idea of him not being human once they had placed him a beating heart. She pushed all thoughts away and returned to the typing. If she had the slightest luck she was praying to have, she would find Marcus's military records.

* * *

Marcus's boots clanked against the metal floor of the corridors. He found himself walking towards the doors of the child he knew as Marla. She was barely nine-years-old and her life was in danger. He found her presence at a point annoying. But once knowing of her condition and being left alone around the base, he had decided it was time to go see how she was holding on. Sliding the door open, her eyes met with his.

She smiled as he closed the door. "I was wondering if you were still here," she spoke lowly. Her breath barely noticeble.

"Where else would I be? I have no other place. And I am no visitor, but a prisinor."

She nodded understanding with sadness. "I guess we're both prisoners." He looked at her. She smiled. "You are prisoner of your thoughts. Of the memories that could hunt you. I am prisoner of leukemia and the compulsion to live till i'm ten," she sighed and closed her eyes. "I guess I wasn't meant to live till that age just like you were meant to live for a long time."

"What makes you so sure you wont make it to ten?"

She looked up at the lights. "My heart. It's tired. And I don't want to force it to live in pain," her eyes met his. "Why would anyone want to live with pain?" He grabbed the stool from the corner and sat on the end of the bed looking down at his hands. "Doctor Elaine says that she understands what I mean." His interest was caught as he looked at the child who smiled looking at the ceiling as if waiting for something or someone to take her. "She told me that her mother died of the same sickness when she was my age and that she always told her that she was in too much pain to be with her while she grew up. The doctor said that she understood and that she let her mom go because she didn't want her to suffer no more."

"So that's why she became a doctor," he spoke mostly to himself looking at his hands.

Marla looked at him as he rubbed his hands, a smile spread on her parched lips. "You like the doctor don't you?"

Marcus looked up at once. "What?" he seemed to half choke.

Marla giggled. "Of cores you do. She's pretty, smart and sweet. Everyone loves her, so why not you too? And you do make a cute couple. Oh wait till I see her and tell her."

Marcus laughed lightly and shook his head. "You should concentrate more on getting better than being a sort of cupid at such an age."

"Cupid? Oh I liked that name. You have to call me Cupid from now on," she demanded with a fragile smile.

* * *

Marcus walked into the room he remembered was the one he had waken up in. His eyes studied the space and landed on a resting Elaine. Her hands folded on the desk and her head laying upon them as her chest moved quietly. He took light steps and stood beside her. He watched her peaceful face with a smile, remembering what Marla had mentioned before. His hand reached out to her, his fingers pushing a strand of her hair around her ear. His hand stood in mid air when his eyes landed on the computer screen.

He exchanged looks between her and the screen with a slight shock at the thought of her searching for him. Searching for anything that had to do with his past. The records began the day he was revived as a machine and ended at the same. A dead end he thought. He looked down at Elaine as she shuffled a bit. What was the reason of her search?


End file.
